HOW MICROSOFT COMPETES

Today Microsoft owns the operating st,stems and basic applications pro grams that run on 270 million. computers. Beyond the genius of co-foun der/CEO Bill Gates, what accounts for the company's dramatic success? From two years of on-site observation and interviewing at Microsoft he adquarters, the authors identify seven complementary strategies that c haracterize how Microsoft competes and operates: Find smart people who know the technology and the business; organize small teams of overlap ping functional specialists; pioneer and orchestrate evolving mass mar kets; focus creativity by evolving, features and ''fixing'' resources; do everything in parallel, with frequent synchronizations; improve th rough continuous self-critiquing, feedback and sharing; attack the fut ure! Moreover, Microsoft's ''synch-and-stabilize'' approach to product development enables the company not only to build an increasing varie ty of complex features and end-products for fast-paced markets with sh ort life cycles, but also to shape evolving mass markets and foster or ganisational learning.